


Mist

by Ayantiel



Category: The Tempest - Shakespeare
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-18
Updated: 2013-10-18
Packaged: 2017-12-29 18:25:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1008591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ayantiel/pseuds/Ayantiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the events of 'The Tempest', Ariel enjoys his freedom and explores the world. He first avoids all human life in fear of ending up in inprisonment again, but he is drawn to them for their shared curiosity, and he finds that they might have more in common than he first thought. But are spirits capable of the same depth of emotions as humans are?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mist

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that this fiction was inspired by Shakespeare's 'The Tempest', and then most notably the film performance of 2010, directed by Julie Taymor. In this film the gender of Prospero was changed and she was thus called Prospera instead.

Howling winds. Raging storms. Lightning crashing and tearing at the world.

Now that he was free, Ariel took full advantage of his powers. He dove and ran and screamed and laughed. By the gods, was it ever good to be free!

It doesn't take long for him to leave the island he had once called home. To finally leave behind that cursed cloven pine in which he had been trapped for a dozen years, and then after it had been the chains of gratitude that had kept him there. He never wants to be bound like that again, so even as he travels the world and he explores his newfound freedom, he avoids all human life.

Yet he finds that wherever he goes, humans go as well. Spurred by curiosity and greed they brave the seas and wildlands unexplored, his only escape from them the depths of the ocean. But that will not do. Too long has he been restricted. Too long has been his own prisoner.

Encouraged by their shared curiosity, Ariel starts to observe them, first from afar, later daring to come closer, invisible on the winds. And he discovers that they have more traits in common then he first imagined.

He had already seen different sides to humanity, in the cursed witch Sycorax who had trapped him in the cloven pine, and in his dear Mistress Prospera who had set him free. But humans are yet stranger. Like the winds they are changeable, sometimes soft and gentle, sometimes raging and destructive. Like oceans deep they are, and like the mountains rough. They contained paradoxes within single individuals and it entranced him. They were like running through mist, thought Ariel, endlessly exciting and mysterious, surprising you with sudden daring acts.

Years he spent watching them. He took to following some around, tracing their steps and watching as they lived their lives. He would tease them, blow their hats off or send a tickling gust of wind their way, or more mischievous things if he disliked them. For his favourites though, Ariel was more benevolent. He gave the old man an extra ray of sunshine on his last day, gave the widow rain to help her cry, and wrapped his invisible arms around the lost child in comfort before guiding her back home with soft songs.

Decades - centuries - passed this way and Ariel thought he had learned everything humankind had to offer, had explored all their hidden depths and seen every possible outcome of every conceivable conflict. And yet there was Lilian. Sweet Lily.

Ariel first came across her when she was only nine years old, a girl demanding that she be allowed to play with her brothers. She wasn't anything special really and Ariel didn't really know why he stayed to watch the children play.

It was years later before he saw her again, but when he did he was just as inexplicably drawn to her. She was engaged by then, an arranged marriage, but not necessarily an unhappy one.

Lilian was practical, even though Ariel didn't understand half of the arrangements humans made or felt necessary, and undeterred by such a small thing as a loveless marriage. Ariel had never seen someone live so dull a life with such spirit and energy. Perhaps that was what enthralled Ariel so.

He watched as she grew from a young girl in an unremarkable young woman. She was a simple seamstress and housewife, and truly Ariel should have long since grown bored of observing her simple life, if not for the way she led it.

There was nothing truly special about her. She was not especially beautiful, or had any remarkable features that drew the eye. And yet, she was a storm. Ariel felt drawn to her as if they were kin, winds swirling, and eventually she takes notice. She would speak to the wind and rain and sunshine, and leave out olive bread. He had no idea where she had learned of his love for its smell, but she did it anyway, luring him in like a bee to the cowslip.

 

'You do not have to be so shy.' She once told the air, and Ariel had been so surprised that he had answered her before he could stop himself.

 

'I am not _shy_.' He bristled.

 

Lily laughed, soft yet clear as a bell.

 

'Then come and join me, spirit. I assume that is what you are.' She said, her smile so kind and welcoming that it took only a moments' hesitation for Ariel to do so. He appeared before her in humanlike shape as to not frighten her, and she smiled at him, looking upon him like one would an old friend they had not seen for many years.

 

'Would your husband not protest upon having a stranger in your home?' He asked.

 

'My husband is not here, and you are not a stranger, are you?' Lily countered. 'If I recall correctly you have been present throughout several years of my life.'

 

'You are sharp to have noticed me.' Ariel said.

 

'Or perhaps you are not as subtle as your perceive.' Those words should have angered him, but made him laugh instead.

 

From then on, Ariel would sometimes join Lily as she worked. She even tried teaching him how to embroider simple patterns in the fabrics, but he did not have the patience for it. He would rather watch her work and swap stories with her. Lily told him infamous tales of man's endeavours, myths of warning and famous plays. In turn, he told her of his travels around the world, of the winds and waves he ran with, which flowers he slept in and sang to her his favourite songs.

They came to realise, that though they had their energetic spirit and curiosity in common, there was yet an unmistakable difference between air spirit and human girl. Ariel did not understand much of the matters of heart, even after observing human fancies for decades. When an officer came to the door years later, informing Lily that her husband had died in the war, she cried for days and Ariel was at a loss as to how to comfort her.

 

'But you did not love him.' He said. 'It was an arranged marriage, where do all these tears come from?'

 

'I do not weep for our love lost, my dear fool.' She said, tears staining her pale cheeks. 'I weep for the end of our shared life. Fourteen years we spent together and now there will never be a fifteenth.'

 

She eventually learned to smile again and Ariel did not pay it much mind at first, humans would always make him wonder, it was part of why he was drawn to them. But when it was Lily who was lost in confusion, it suddenly became a more pressing matter.

 

'Why are you angry?' She cried out to the winds as he danced amidst a thunderstorm one night.

 

'I am not angry.' He said. 'I have no reason to be angry.'

 

'Then why do you rage so?' She asked as she shivered pitifully in the rain.

 

But Ariel could not hear her over the drums of the thunder and he tossed his head back and laughed. Oh what delicious energy! The air was ablaze with; _he_ was ablaze with it.

When the storm had passed he turned to find Lily but could not find her. He looked all over the small town, searched in her home, but she was nowhere to be found. Only when he called out to her did he finally hear her soft voice.

 

'I am here, Ariel.' She stepped out of the corner of the bedroom in which she had hidden. Looking upon her, Ariel suddenly noticed the effect of the years that had passed since they first met. Her face held lines as her hair held silver strings of starlight. At once Ariel became aware of her fragility and all fire of the storm left him.

 

'You fear me.' It was both a question and a statement.

 

'Yes' she whispered, her voice barely audible if not for the wind carrying it to him.

 

'As you should.' Ariel said with a pained smile. He turned to leave but stopped when she spoke.

 

'I fear you because you could hurt me. But it seems to me, that I have the power to hurt you as well.'

 

It was true, Ariel realised. As a spirit of the wind and seas he had reflected every emotion shown to him, but never had it reached beyond, reached deep and actually moved him.

Her arms wrapped around him as she hugged him from behind. Ariel's heart ached and rejoiced at the touch, and he raised his hands to lay them on hers. His shape had never been so human as then. They stood like that for a few moments before they parted and he turned towards her.

Something had shifted between them. The still were a mystery to each other and would never understand, but somehow that was alright now. Ariel wanted to walk into the mist with her. He looked upon her, his eyes searching hers for permission. She gave a small nod and a smile, and he bent to press a soft kiss on her lips.

 

'You are cold.' she whispered when they parted.

 

'The wind usually is.' Ariel whispered in return.

 

He would lose her eventually he realised. He had always known it of course, he was an immortal spirit and she a mortal human woman, but it had never affected him before. He simply had not cared for the humans before, it was not in his nature.

 

'Were I human, I would love you endlessly.' He whispered as he let a soft hand caress her cheek.

 

'But us humans are not immortal like you. How could your love be endless then but not as you are now?' She asked.

 

'Because when I would die, my love for you would not. It would forever warm the earth as my last dying thought. As an immortal spirit, my affections change as the wind. How could they not, when I would spend aeons without you to love?'

 

Ariel smiled, his eyes sad but fond. 'That is the curse of immortality, my dear. Even eternal love becomes a fleeting fancy.'

 

She was silent for a long time and Ariel watched the emotions play across her sweet face with fond curiosity.

 

'But you do love me?' She asked at last. 'Do you, my sweet Ariel?'

 

Ariel thought for a moment. He would not want to speak a careless lie when she deserved the truth.

 

'I am not sure.' He said. 'All I can say for certain is that I hold a deep affection for you, one like which I have never felt before. But I am not sure it is the love you humans give your whole heart to. Spirits do not feel emotions as deeply as humans do.'

 

'Don't they? Truly, Ariel?' Lily said, her eyes sharp and knowing. 'Is it not that you do not dare to, for fear of the loss being too great in the end?'

 

'I have simply never felt so deeply. For a spirit to feel at all, it is an oddity. I am like the clouds, dear lady, fleeting and swirling. So I would not pretend to know if it is an unconscious act of self-preservation or simply the nature of my kind.'

 

'Whichever it is, do you regret it? Sparing so much thought to a simple human such as I?' Lily asked.

 

'Dear lady, you humans are many things but simple is not one of them!' He exclaimed. 'I would not ever regret it, for it would be like regretting the awe that lightning brings.'

 

He stayed with her for many more years. And when she died, he was the mist over her grave.

 

The End.


End file.
